The Clerk, the Duke and the Prince of Wales

In 1963 my great-uncle, Carl Burton Cummer, retired after a 38-year career with the City of Calgary. The following is a portion of a transcription of his memoir.

Calgary, Alta. Aug. 10/81

Re Carl B, Cummer, Ex-City Clerk, City of Calgary.

I was approached by the Glenbow Foundation to do an interview concerning my early days in Calgary, background leading up to my employment with the City, and experience during my years of service with the City.  The result, I am afraid, lead to a boring ninety minutes of my disjointed ramblings on tape which, due to my verbosity, never did get to the point of telling about my work with the City.  The taped interview was hurriedly prepared for by short notes on memories of my childhood days without sufficient consideration being given to continuity.  I decided then I could do a better job by putting in writing the rest of the things I will endeavor to tell about.

I commenced working for the City on Feb 16th, 1925 and retired with date of January 24th, 1963.  Now, at the age of seventy-eight, having enjoyed eighteen years of retirement, I look back with fond memories and pleasure on these years when I was privileged to serve the Citizens of Calgary in my various capacities ranging from stenographer clerk, to Secretary to the City Clerk, to Assistant City Clerk and ultimately City Clerk,

With regard to this account of my memoirs and observations and comments pertaining to the years spent in the city service, it is my hope that in years to come my efforts may help to shed some light on the manner in which the City functioned during these specific thirty-seven years with which I am familiar. 

 In 1925 the city’s population was around 60,000.  At the time of my retirement in 1963 it had increased to about 275,000.  During the past 18 years that figure has now more than doubled and there seems to be no let-up in Calgary’s fantastic growth.  [[Population of Calgary 2023: 1,640,000. Editor]]

Subsequent to my retirement, due to the tremendous volume of extra work involved by the population increase, several of the functions of the City Clerk’s Department have evolved into separate entities such as the printing operations, mail distribution, voters list preparation etc.  Others have been transferred to the jurisdiction of other departments.

Perhaps I’d better start this off with an explanation of where the City Clerk’s Department fits into the over-all picture of the City’s operations. In the first place, by Provincial statute, the City Clerk. along with three or four other key officials is required to be appointed by bylaw.  What are the duties?  Perhaps a concise way of putting it would be to include here an extract from a call for application for the job which the Personnel Department published, seeking a replacement for my successor, City Clerk Harry Sales, who passed away on the job in 1976, within months of his time for retirement.

 [[In addition to the newspaper clipping, Carl’s manuscript contains a detailed list of the responsibilities of the City Clerk. I will transcribe these at a later date. Ed.]]

Looking back to my early days with the City, I recall my bewilderment with all the activity going on around me.  While I had what was considered good business college training, especially in typing and shorthand, I had not had any practical experience and in consequence had to ask what were no doubt dumb questions until I got my bearings.  Fortunately my bosses, J.M. Shiller [[sp?]], then City Clerk, and his assistant Louchlane A. Campbell, were patient and understanding and I survived that introductory period.

Shortly after I started in, Commissioner A.G. Graves dropped into the office to dictate a letter, the Commissioner’s secretary having been busy at the time.  He gave me the name of the City Engineer to whom the letter was to be addressed, then the heading which sounded to me like “Re Gravel Pit” then “Re Ites.”  Now I wasn’t aware that the Commissioner, who had an English accent, dropped his “R’s,”  so thinking he had changed his mind, I said, “Which do you mean?  ‘Re Gravel Pit’ or ‘Re Ites’?” not knowing what “Ites” were but determined to ask the boss later.  Mr. Campbell whose desk was right beside mine came to the rescue and said, “Re Gravel Pit Rea Heights.”  See how you learn things quickly even though it be an embarrassing way?  That’s how I learned that there was a district called Rea Heights and that there was a gravel pit there. 

John Morton Miller, “Jack” to almost everyone, came to Calgary from Winnipeg where he had been employed as Secretary to the Mayor.  He was in his early twenties when he got the job as City Clerk – about 1916 I believe – and held that position for over 45 years, a record term of office for any City of Calgary official.  He had a host of friends and was a great booster for Calgary.  He was often referred to as “Mr. Calgary.”  He had an outstanding personality and got along well with all the Mayors, Commissioners and Aldermen under whom he served, as well as with his fellow Department Heads and employees.  Jack was a real sportsman.  He raised pointer dogs and competed in field trials for many years.  As Secretary of the Alberta Field Trials Club he used to cover the trials for some of the international sporting magazines.  He was also an ardent hockey, baseball and football fan, sports being his favorite topic of conversation, followed by politics – a subject he loved to argue over with anyone who wasn’t of the same mind.

He was an authority on the proportional representation system of voting and would spare no effort to convince skeptics of the merits of the system. The system was inaugurated in 1917, shortly after his arrival and he and James Barnes, his assistant at that time, devised the intricate procedure for carrying out the count.  Improvements and innovations were introduced throughout the years but basically the system changed very little and served its purpose well until proportional representation was abandoned when the City reverted to the “X” system.

Jack loved to recount amusing stories about his experiences, a couple of which come to my mind.

in 1912 HRH the duke of connaught and his family presided over the inaugural calgary stampede.

One concerned a visit to the City of H.R.H. The Duke of Connaught [[a son of the late-Queen Victoria. Ed.]], the Duchess and Princess Patricia in 1912.  School children were given the day off from school for the occasion.  The downtown streets along which the royal entourage was to travel were elaborately decorated and were lined with adults and children alike.  Pictures of the visitors had appeared in the local papers prior to their arrival.  By a strange coincidence, one of the City Clerk’s staff, a distinguished-looking middle-aged English gentleman named Duncan Pierson strongly resembled the Duke.

Then, as has always been the case throughout the years, all members of the staff were allocated certain details to attend to during the visit.  Mr. Pierson’s role was to precede the entourage in order to see that everything was in order along the route.  Duncan never learned to drive so he sat alongside the driver in an open car as he proceeded to carry out his mission.  To his consternation and embarrassment he was mistaken for the Duke and was applauded all along the way.  A lot of the children having concluded “that was it,” they went home and never got to see the Royal visitors.

1923 HRH Edward prince of wales at his alberta ranch.

The other favorite story concerned a visit by H.R.H. the Prince of Wales (who later was later to become King Edward VIII) to his High River Ranch. [[For more on the EP Ranch and the Prince’s connection to Southern Alberta.]]  His itinerary included an appearance on the platform in front of the grandstand at our Stampede grounds.  It was the occasion for another school holiday and the grandstand was filled to capacity by children and their escorts impatiently waiting for the appearance of His Royal Highness.  The children were asked to cheer their loudest when given the signal as soon as the City’s official car came through the North gate and proceeded around the racetrack to the front of the stands.  All details and timing had been meticulously worked out beforehand as is always the case of visits from Royalty. 

george lane, archie maclean, hrh edward prince of wales at the ep ranch.

 At the appointed time when the most elaborate car that could be obtained was due to come through the gate, nothing happened.  There was a snag in the arrangements somewhere along the line.  The car that was to have picked up the Prince had been despatched in ample time.  Who would ever have thought that it was to arrive at his ranch to find that the Prince was nowhere to be found?  Meanwhile, the Prince had thought it a good idea to take a stroll over to get acquainted with one of his neighboring ranchers.  Having visited for a while, the prince remarked that he had better get back to his ranch as he had to take a trip to Calgary.  The neighbor told him he had to go into Calgary also and offered to drive him in – an offer which the Prince accepted.  The result was consternation when a somewhat dilapidated conveyance came through the North Gate, rounded the race track and disembarked HRH the Prince of Wales.

 I can’t vouch for the authenticity of these two yarns and doubt over the years they gained some embellishment with the telling, however they were amusing incidents.